diff --git a/lib/kafka/protocol/message.rb b/lib/kafka/protocol/message.rb
index 06e91d4b5..7f6181e50 100644
--- a/lib/kafka/protocol/message.rb
+++ b/lib/kafka/protocol/message.rb
@@ -88,7 +88,10 @@ def self.decode(decoder)
         # attributes.
         codec_id = attributes & 0b111
 
-        new(key: key, value: value, codec_id: codec_id, offset: offset, create_time: Time.at(timestamp / 1000.0))
+        # The timestamp will be nil if the message was written in the Kafka 0.9 log format.
+        create_time = timestamp && Time.at(timestamp / 1000.0)
+
+        new(key: key, value: value, codec_id: codec_id, offset: offset, create_time: create_time)
       end
 
       private
diff --git a/spec/fixtures/message-0.9-format b/spec/fixtures/message-0.9-format
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..a166ef946
Binary files /dev/null and b/spec/fixtures/message-0.9-format differ
diff --git a/spec/protocol/message_spec.rb b/spec/protocol/message_spec.rb
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..c1ad47a90
--- /dev/null
+++ b/spec/protocol/message_spec.rb
@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
+describe Kafka::Protocol::Message do
+  it "encodes and decodes messages" do
+    message = Kafka::Protocol::Message.new(
+      value: "yolo",
+      key: "xx",
+    )
+
+    io = StringIO.new
+    encoder = Kafka::Protocol::Encoder.new(io)
+    message.encode(encoder)
+    data = StringIO.new(io.string)
+    decoder = Kafka::Protocol::Decoder.new(data)
+
+    expect(Kafka::Protocol::Message.decode(decoder)).to eq message
+  end
+
+  it "decodes messages written in the 0.9 format" do
+    data = File.open("spec/fixtures/message-0.9-format")
+
+    decoder = Kafka::Protocol::Decoder.new(data)
+    message = Kafka::Protocol::Message.decode(decoder)
+
+    expect(message.key).to eq "xx"
+    expect(message.value).to eq "yolo"
+
+    # Messages didn't have timestamps back in the 0.9 days.
+    expect(message.create_time).to eq nil
+  end
+end